Afternoon at the Carnival

Afternoon at the Carnival 
(957 words)

Triumphant giggles fluttered up Jeff's throat as he banged his bumper-car into Suzy's.

"Gotcha!" he crowed.

Suzy pursed her lips and resisted complaining to her parents.  She wasn't a little baby anymore, she was six and it was time she started acting like an adult. 

She jockeyed her car out of the way before Jeff could slam into her again.  The lopsided competition between the cousins favored older, faster Jeff.  Suzy was relieved when the electricity flickered out, and their bright little cars slid to a halt.

Suzy jumped out of her car, unaware that her new dress was rucked up well above her knees, and skipped over to her parents.  Her mother smoothed Suzy's skirt down and clucked over her messy hair.  Next to them, Jeff's parents laughed as he swaggered up.
Suzy's father grinned at her.  "What do you want to do now, Button?" he asked, as the cheerful group navigated the crowded carnival midway, past the Ferris wheel toward the roller coaster.  The coaster's glittering sign proclaimed "The Super Flyer – Best Ride in the Universe!" 

"Ride the Super Flyer!  Ride the Super Flyer!"  Suzy sprang up and down like a pogo-stick.

"I'm sorry, Button.  You're too small, they won't let you on.  But here's a cotton candy machine!  How'd you like some of that?"

Suzy accepted the fluffy sweet distraction from her father, and the two families trooped away toward the whirling Scrambler.

Jeff lagged behind.  His attention was captured by a nearby trash basket.  Soda cans, half eaten hot dogs, melting fudgie bars, empty popcorn boxes and candy wrappers overflowed the container and scattered across the ground.  Greedy flies and yellow-jackets buzzed among the debris. 

"Jeffy!" his mother called from the crowd.

"Coming!" he reassured her.  As he turned to go, his long green tongue snaked out and snatched a surprised yellow-jacket out of the air.

Suzy pulled on her father, dragging him toward the game booths.

Jeff caught up as they passed the Ball Pit, where children frolicked and dove, supported by thousands of colorful little spheres.  Paper thin cries of pain were drowned out by the children's gleeful voices.  Laughter turned to shrieks and back to laughter again as several balls popped liked diseased boils, spraying everyone with blood and mucus.

Their fathers chuckled together.  One said, "They should really get some new Kri-Kries.  Those ones are too old and brittle."

They passed the "Dunk-A-Duvler" game, ignoring the duvler's wails as it was dropped into the acid vat.  They stepped with care across the violet grass, avoiding the schmoo at the “Gloopus Throw.’  Schmoos had notoriously bad aim and no one wanted to be hit by an enraged gloopus.  Then they approached the Air Rifle Booth.

"Step right up!  Try your skill!"  The jolly green barker's cadence rang like an old-time radio announcer.

"Come on, little lady!  One free try for you.  All you have to do is aim and shoot!"

"Can I, Daddy, can I?" Suzy begged.

"Okay, Suzy-Button."  Her father's ears flapped in encouragement.

Suzy wrapped her claws around the lightweight rifle.  Desperate eyes watched her from the back of the booth.

She aimed and pulled the trigger.  The rifle hissed like a can of hairspray and there was a yelp of pain from the target.  Suzy's fangs showed in a brilliant smile.

"Congratulations!" The barker flicked his tail to indicate prizes lined up on nearby shelves.  "You get to choose a prize." 

Jeff suggested, "Get one of those skinny things."  He pointed to glass jars which held icky-pink, two legged creatures.  The puny creatures looked despondent and a few were sobbing into their hands.  A few pounded their tiny fists on the glass and implored Suzy to save them.

Suzy's mother spat, "No, not those revolting humans!"  Her long ears rippled back in disgust.

Suzy stretched out one sharp, black talon toward the jars of thin lackluster humans.  The hopeful humans held their collective breaths in anticipation.  Then the claw moved on and came to rest on a segmented blue caterpillar in a plastic bag.  The caterpillar's big eyes glowed with merry sparkles, and its fuzzy coat blinked from blue to green to violet, then back to blue again.

"I'll take the Andromeda caterpillar."

The humans in the glass jars hung their heads in disappointment.

As the two families left the Air Rifle booth, the fathers shared a relieved look.

"Bet you're glad she didn't take those ugly little ones.  They make lousy pets.  Jeff once had a whole colony of them in a terrarium.  They were loud, smelly and they ate a lot. For some reason, they kept knocking down the miniature palm trees and dragging them across the ground to spell out "HELP."  When Jeff got tired of them, I had to take them out and dump them in the woods."

Suzy's father kidded, "But you know the urban legend!  If you let them loose, they'll grow big and wild."  He raised his scaled hands and wiggled them menacingly.  "And dangerous!"  His voice rolled up and down through the word like the Super Flyer on its tracks.

He laughed at his joke, but Jeff's father hesitated as a sliver of giddy fear ran up and down his humps.  He thought: How could the pitiful little things be harmful?  No, of course they couldn't be.  Yet, sometimes, things are not as they seem.  His ruff whipped back and forth as he shook the suspicion away, and then he crinkled his feeding slit in amusement. 

Suzy's father bared his fangs with laughter and clapped Jeff's father on his largest, fur-covered hump.  The fathers escorted their families back to their cars; the music and laughter of the merrymaking faded along with the memory of little icky-pink things in glass jars.